Best, Gary A. Silent Invaders. Combat Gliders of the Second World War

Combat gliders were called by some as Death Crates, Purple Heart Boxes, Flying Coffins and Tow Targets . They were not pretty and had no graceful lines. Viewed from the front, they had a pug nose and a sloping Neanderthal forehead. Their wings looked like the heavily starched ears of a jackrabbit placed at right angles on a canvas-covered frame. Twice the length of the body, these wings were eighty-four feet in length, 70 per cent as long as the Wright Brothers first powered flight at Kitty Hawk. They could not become airborne, let alone fly, unless assisted by an engine-powered tow plane. And for those riding in the back, it was like flying through the gates of hell. The men who were trained and assigned to guide gliders into battle were said to be the only pilots who had no motors, armament, parachutes and no second chances. Like the aircraft they commanded, they were called inglorious names such as the Bastards Nobody Wanted, Glider Gladiators in Wooden Chariots; Hybrid Jackasses and Glory Boys. Beautifully written, profoundly illustrated and researched, "Silent Invaders. Combat Gliders of the Second World War" is a work that is dedicated to those brave men under impossible odds from the British and American servicemen on D-Day, the doomed Operation Market Garden in Holland and Hitler's radical commando raid to rescue Mussolini.

The men who were trained and deployed to lead cargo gliders into battle were supposedly the only pilots who had no engines, no armament, no parachutes and no second chances. Like the aeroplanes they flew, they bore inglorious names such as "bastards nobody wanted", "glider gladiators in wooden chariots", "hybrid fools" and "glory boys". This comprehensively illustrated and extensively researched book is a work dedicated to those brave men who flew these cargo gliders under the most difficult conditions in some of the most important missions of the Second World War: including the British and American air landings on D-Day, Operation "Market Garden" or the German liberation operation for the imprisoned Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.